Dad Gum It

The freshman Florida State kicker was wearing gold shoes. Drawing attention to oneself at Florida State is nothing new. Ever heard of a guy named Deon Sanders? But this may have taunted the fates worse than a Boise State lineman after a win against Oregon. Surely he has heard “Wide Right” and “Wide Left” more times than the infamous tomahawk chop chant. But, there he was on the field in gold shoes.

He seemed to be winning the game against the ghosts of the past early as he made a 52 yard field goal. Then, a seemingly uneventful extra point was missed, wide left. As it turns out, it was huge. Florida State had to go for a touchdown instead of a field goal at the end of the game and well, the ball ended up neither wide right nor wide left but simply, dropped. Game over. Miami beats Florida State.

College football is exciting for its unpredictability as well as its irony. “4th and 5 for the National Championship” was Keith Jackson’s call back in 2005 when Texas played USC. I was terrified of seeing an incomplete pass at that moment. As we all know now, Vince Young ran it in and Texas won.

Last night, the pass into the end zone at the end of the game by Florida State reminded me of that famous saying Daryl Royal had, “three things can happen when you pass and two of them are bad”. The entire stadium thought the guy was going to catch the ball. The announcer even yelled touchdown. But no, once again for Florida State it was “dad gum it”.